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Increase risk of blood clot with newer contraceptive pills

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Summary of story from The Telegraph, October 26, 2011

Research has revealed that newer types of contraceptive pills are twice as likely to cause life-threatening blood clots in women than older versions.

Three million women in Britain take oral contraception, and although experts say that birth control pills remain “remarkably safe”, and may even be beneficial in lowering cancer risks, there is also the increased risk of a blood clot in deep leg veins, known as venous thromboembolism (VTE).

VTEs can be fatal if they travel to the lungs.

The study was carried out by scientists at the University of Copenhagen, and looked at the health of millions of women in Denmark between the ages of 15 and 49, their contraception records and cases of blood clots between 2001 and 2009.

They found that 4,246 women suffered their first VTE during that time.

Women who took old-style pills, which contain levonorgestrel, increased their risk of VTE by three times, while those on the newer type, the most common of which is marketed as Yasmin, increased their risk by six times.

As a result, experts are now recommending that women who are on the newer type of “third-generation” contraceptive pills, which were developed in the 1980s, should change to a different brand.

Dr Philip Hannaford, of the University of Aberdeen, compared the two.

“It is difficult not to conclude that combined oral contraceptives with desogestrel, gestodene or drospirenone confer a higher risk of venous thromboembolism than those with levonorgestrel.”

But he added that it was important “not to exaggerate the risk”.

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